A Declaration of Dependence

To the citizens of the United States of America

In the light of your failure to elect a proper President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories. Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new Prime Minister (The Right Honorable Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a Minister for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate will be disbanded.

A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up “aluminum.” Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. The letter ‘U’ will be reinstated in words such as ‘favor’ and ‘neighbor,’ skipping the letter ‘U’ is nothing more than laziness on your part. Likewise, you will learn to spell ‘doughnut’ without skipping half the letters. You will end your love affair with the letter ‘Z’ (pronounced ‘zed’ not ‘zee’) and the suffix “is” will be replaced by the suffix “ise”. You will learn that the suffix ‘burgh’ is pronounced ‘burra’ e.g. Edinburgh. You are welcome to respell Pittsburgh as ‘Pittsberg’ if you can’t cope with correct pronunciation. Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary”. Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as “like” and “you know” is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. Look up “interspersed”. There will be no more ‘bleeps’ in the Jerry Springer show. If you’re not old enough to cope with bad language then you shouldn’t have chat shows. When you learn to develop your vocabulary then you won’t have to use bad language as often.

On your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter ‘u’ and the elimination of “-ize”.

You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn’t that hard. English accents are not limited to Cockney, upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier). You will also have to learn how to understand regional accents – Scottish dramas such as “Taggart” will no longer be broadcast with subtitles. While we’re talking about regions, you must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is “Devon”. If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all American States will become “shires” >e.g. Texasshire, Floridashire, Louisianashire.

Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors to play English characters. British sit-coms such as “Men Behaving Badly” or “Red Dwarf” will not be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audience who can’t cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness.

You should relearn your original national anthem, “God Save The Queen”, but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

You should stop playing American “football”. There is only one kind of football. What you refer to as American “football” is not a very good game. The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays “American” football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football. Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American “football”, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US rugby sevens side by 2005. You should stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the ‘World Series’ for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.15% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. Instead of baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls’ game called “rounders” which is baseball without fancy team strip, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs.

You should declare war on Quebec and France, using nuclear weapons if they give you any merde. “Merde” is French for “Shit”. The 97.85% of you who were not aware that there is a world outside your borders should count yourselves lucky. The Russians have never been the bad guys. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable peeler. Because we don’t believe you are sensible enough to handle potentially dangerous items, you will require a permit if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2th will be a new national holiday, but only in England. It will be called “Indecisive Day”.

All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. You will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips. Fries aren’t even French, they are Belgian though 97.85% of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium. Those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called “crisps”. Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be served warm and flat. Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with customers.

As a sign of penance, 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be added to all tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this quantity to be doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.

The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all, it is lager. From November 1st only proper British Bitter will be referred to as “beer”, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as “Lager”. The substances formerly known as “American Beer” will henceforth be referred to as “Near-Frozen Knat’s Urine”, with the exception of the product of the American Budweiser company whose product will be referred to as “Weak Near-Frozen Knat’s Urine”. This will allow true Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in Pilsen, Czech Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

From December 1st the UK will harmonise petrol (or “Gasoline” as you will be permitted to keep calling it until April 1st 2005) prices with the former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices to those of the former USA and the Former USA will, in return, adopt UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon – get used to it).

You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you’re not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you’re not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist then you’re not grown up enough to handle a gun.

Please tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us crazy.

Tax collectors from Her Majesty’s Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your cooperation.

___

email forward via Annabel; thanks bubs!

Rice is the new Pasta

Excellent, the new US Secretary of State is the ex-namesake of an oil tanker. Doesn’t that just fill your hearts with warm fuzzies?

But is there a good side? David Corn writes that this provides an excellent chance for the Democrats to keep pestering the Bush 2.2 Administration:

Why didn’t the president and you bother to read the National Intelligence Estimate on Iraq before he decided to go to war? Why weren’t there Cabinet-level meetings on what to do after the invasion about the obvious economic, political, legal, and security challenges that would be faced in Iraq? Why did Bush say there were “stockpiles” of biological weapons in Iraq even when the overstated intelligence did not report this? Why did he devote more time pre-9/11 to ballistic missile defense rather than to counterterrorism? Oh, the list could go on for days.

Update 18/11: This column by John Nichols* sums up why I dislike Condi quite nicely.

After Rice appeared in that city in September, the Seattle Times newspaper pointed out that, “Rice sounded at times like a candidate.” In a sense, she was. Prior to the election, Washington was abuzz with speculation about the all-but-certain departure of Secretary of State Colin Powell, the closest thing the administration had to an independent man of government — as opposed to the programmed politicos who peopled most major posts in the Bush White House. Rice, who began campaigning for the Secretary of State post before the 2000 election, did not want there to be any doubt on the part of Bush or Vice President Dick Cheney, the man who runs foreign policy for the administration, that she would be a more loyal and dramatically more politicized player than Powell.

…

Just as she politicized the national security adviser to an extent never before seen, she will politicize the State Department. Any pretense of independence or pragmatism will be discarded as quickly as was the tradition of keeping the national security adviser out of politics.

With Powell, its feeble defender, on the way out of the State Department, the last small voices of dissent within the foreign policy bureaucracy will begin to fall silent. If Rice is confirmed, as seems certain considering the partisan divide in the Senate, the Department of State where Thomas Jefferson, William Jennings Bryan and George Marshall once presided, will be little more than an arm of the White House political operation. And the Secretary of State, who has already proven herself to be more interested in campaigning than in defending the best interests of the nation or its security, will not be a diplomat. She will be a politician, nothing more and, certainly, nothing less.

One of my politics lecturers predicted Powell would go before the start of Iraq War II last year, either because he felt dirty being associated with Dubya or because he’d be chucked for having a brain capable of thinking on its own. Dr Rice shouldn’t have any of those problems, but it looks like the embedding of partisan interests in the Bush 2.2 Administration is just going to get worse. And this can’t possibly be a good thing.

Even if she is a politician (because, let’s face it, who isn’t these days?), the position of her politics is dangerous. If I’d blogged when Powell was appointed I would have said the same thing, but honestly, how can someone who was in charge of national security (you’d be kicking yourself if 9/11 happened on your watch, eh?) and so gung-ho about going to bloody war be a diplomat? I know I’m a bleeding heart liberal idealist who will just get crushed like a bug if I ever moved away from my laptop, but surely the whole point of diplomacy is to avoid war?

Why not just get rid of the Secretary of State job altogether? It’d be perfect economic rationalist policy. I understand Rice’s appointment is a logical conclusion after an ex-General, but this just solidifies the Administration’s obsession with political realism in foreign policy. National interest, alliances, military might, blah di blah di blah. Is it working, darlings? No, no it bloody well isn’t.

Dr Rice should remember what she used to teach at Stanford:

C students rush to war, while A students work diligently and patiently toward peaceful solutions to international problems. When the Iraqi crisis has ended, what grade will the current Administration have earned?

I’d give them an F.

___

*Ah, The Nation. I would be adrift in a sea of “Huh?” and “Umm” without you.

Jesus speaks through the Republicans

Via the Daily Kos:

I hope the election of George W. Bush is seen as a wake-up call to all the liberal Democrats who oppose God’s will.

It is His doing that George W. Bush is still our president. Millions of born-again Christians helped win this election through our prayers and votes. Jesus speaks through the Republicans.

The Democrats will not be able to win elections until they renounce their sinful ways and stop encouraging abortions, gayness, and trying to take away our guns.

Earl Balboa

Washington Township (mcall.com)

Reading something like that never fails to make me feel intelligently superior, but then I remember that these people get to choose who runs my world (as pointed out by The Chaser Decides team, this person votes) and I want to cry.

I have decided to do my Honours thesis on the development of the Christian Right, both in Australia and the USA. I’d been tossing around the idea of looking at political satire because it’d be loads of fun, but last month my supervisor, Dr Bob, suggested I pick an issue that really pisses me off as a topic because then I’d be motivated to research and discuss it for a year. I can also argue against it properly when the opportunity arises.

Now I don’t plan to sit down next year and outline how Jesus cannot possibly speak through the Republicans given that his own platform was so clearly left-wing (was JC’s gun as shiny as yours, Earl?), but I hope to nut out some issues such as: What is the place of religion in politics? Why is the issue growing in countries where the separation of Church and state is a constitutionally enshrined concept? And why does it scare me so much?

But before I can write an Honours thesis, I suppose I should pass my exams this semester.

Dear 49% of America…

Apology accepted. We know you tried, guys, and we feel your pain…

Bush has no mandate and I know you can fight him. That’s the way your country was set up; please remember that. Stand and fight, we’re counting on you.

Lots of love,

Sunili